Bites of Life
by TwistedSky
Summary: 10 new Chlollie bits . . . which makes 19 in total. Fluffy little important/random life-moments for Chloe and Oliver. Complete.
1. Chapter 1

Moments from Chlollie-life. It will eventually get to 19. But for now . . . yeah. Also: not in order. *again, with the not owning*

* * *

#1: Domesticity

"Eek!" Chloe ungracefully shrieked as Ollie sprayed her with the kitchen hose.

Oh, he was going down for this.

They had been, very domestically, doing the dishes together-she scrubbing, he rinsing-until he'd brought up how domestic it was.

Not funny.

He'd been trying to get her to marry him for days. And she kept saying no, she loved him, but she wasn't ready for "forever" again.

After all, look at what had happened with Jimmy.

Chloe had attempted to change the subject, so she'd taken her soapy hands, and splashed a bit of soap and water on his face.

He had not been amused.

It had turned into him grabbing the spray hose and dousing her with water.

From that they'd both gotten very naked, and very, very wet on the kitchen floor.

And she was still saying no.

For now.

But Ollie knew quite well that he was wearing her down. She would say yes.

* * *

#2: No takebacks

Oliver Queen was nervous.

Just a little.

Okay, maybe a lot.

He'd been rescued by the league, but he hadn't quite had a moment with Chloe yet-alone.

They had to talk.

He'd . . . blurted out that he loved her over the comms.

Without finesse, discarding his plans to woo her.

Sure, he'd known he was in trouble, and he'd desperately wanted her to know it. But, if he'd had the time to think about it, he wouldn't have told her. It wouldn't be fair to tell her how he felt just before he was taken from her. Sightly selfish, that.

But he _hadn't_ been taken from her.

He was okay.

And he was in love with Chloe.

And she loved him too.

But if she said that she hadn't meant it, it might kill him.

_Wait_.

Why was he going to give her the opportunity to take it back?

Why was he going to give her the chance to hide behind fear, and pretend that she hadn't meant it?

What the hell was wrong with him?

If she hadn't meant it, she wouldn't have said it.

And he could see it sometimes on her face. Her face always shuttered soon after, but her reaction time was getting worse day by day.

She was stuck with him now.

There was no way he was going to let her hide. There was no way he was going to let her go.

Like a slightly immature child, he was holding onto one of his favorite rules: _no takebacks_.

Ever.

* * *

#3: Panic

Damn.

She closed her eyes, considered praying-dismissed the idea considering that it seemed a little awful-and took a deep breath.

_Breathe_.

She opened her eyes. _Pregnant_.

Oh dear. What was she going to do? Ollie.

Oh, great.

Now he'd never give up on his quest to make her marry him.

And she'd been weakening lately.

If she said yes now, it might be partially because of the pregnancy.

No. She couldn't.

She stiffened.

She would not do that.

Chloe Sullivan was going to be a mother.

It couldn't be that hard, right?

Oh, no. She was definitely screwed.

She placed her hand on her stomach, still flat as ever.

She was going to be a mother.

She felt a sudden flash of panic.

What was she going to tell Ollie?

_Maybe _she wasn't pregnant.

It could be a false positive.

Maybe she needed another test. Maybe two. _Ten_.

When it turned out she wasn't pregnant, she first felt sadness. Then relief.

They weren't ready for parenthood yet.

But they would be, one day.

* * *

#4: Beds

He may have had a tendency to sprawl across the bed in his sleep-but that was nothing compared to her.

She moved so much, and she hogged the blankets.

He supposed it was worth it.

After all, she wasn't fond of sleeping in the bed with him.

He supposed that they could always get a bigger bed.

Yes, that was it.

A bigger bed.

* * *

#5: Peanuts

She was slightly mad.

Oliver watched her with concern.

But he simply refused to get in her way.

She wasn't the angry sort of mad. She was the slightly borderline insane type.

"Who knew there were so many products with peanuts in them?" she tossed out.

Oh, this was good.

She was back to talking.

She'd been silent for the past fifteen or so minutes.

Scary minutes.

"Well, it's a good thing they come with warnings, right? I mean, imagine a world without ingredient lists. Now that's scary."

Not as scary as she was though.

She turned to him, from the cupboard in the area that had been made into the Watchtower kitchen. She turned slowly, so he knew he was in for it.

"Would you like to die, Ollie?"

"Um, no thanks," he almost visibly shrunk under her glare.

"Exactly. So there will be no more peanuts in this place. This is a safe zone. This is why we don't go on vacation Oliver. While we were gone, not only did the team make a mess of this place, but they left behind disasters waiting to happen."

"These, peanuts!" She picked up a container that held honey roasted planters.

"Actual peanuts!" She fumed. "What the hell is wrong with them? Do they want to kill you?"

Oliver thought for a moment, "Well, at least they're very clearly labeled. I mean, they're obviously peanuts, unlike some foods which just kind of hide them in very tiny print," he squinted his eyes.

It did not stop her anger.

She turned back with an angry _humph_, tossing things in the plastic bag she'd grabbed.

Apparently just throwing the peanuty foods away was not enough.

You had to, she'd explained, get them completely out of Watchtower. In fact, this way they could donate the food to a good cause. Possibly Bart. Plus, the peanuts couldn't just stay in Watchtower.

What if the trash fell over, and something spilled, and Oliver happened to come in contact with it?

Ollie smiled, it was kind of sweet that she was so worried about him.

He wasn't going to tell her that.

He wasn't insane.

Chloe made another angry noise.

She was.

He loved her for it.

* * *

#6: Maybe

He'd stopped asking her.

Maybe it meant he'd given up.

At first she'd been rather suspicious-thought maybe he was trying to trick her into wanting him to propose.

But she hadn't heard a peep from him on the subject in almost two months.

It was making her nervous. And in a sick kind of way, she missed the proposals.

A little. He'd gotten quite creative.

She missed it.

She missed him. Recently he'd been a bit withdrawn, and there were times that he looked at her with a wounded puppy dog look.

She'd hurt him, and she could barely remember why she was still holding out.

He _wanted _to marry her. Everyone was on his side, too.

She wasn't cut out for marriage. But he was, it seemed.

Playboy millionaire, Oliver Queen. He wanted to marry her. He wanted to be her husband.

Lois, in her typical blunt style, had informed her that if she loved him, she'd do what he needed.

He needed her, she'd said.

And, frankly, she was being selfish.

Chloe thought there was a bit of truth in that.

Maybe she was right.

Maybe Ollie-maybe they _both _deserved this.

* * *

#7: Cake

"Pie?"

Chloe looked at the completely bewildered look on Oliver's face and almost laughed.

"Yes, pie."

He looked very, very confused.

"But . . . pie? Why?"

"I like pie, Ollie. What's wrong with pie? It's my birthday. I want pie."

She was being irrational, Ollie decided. No one chose pie over cake.

It was almost like she could read his mind.

"I am not being unreasonable. I like pie. And with all of the leftover cake from Lois and Clark's wedding . . . I'm really tired of it. If I have to eat anymore cake, I may feel the strong, evil urge to smash it into your face."

Hmm, she thought. Maybe she should do that anyway.

It would be amusing.

"Fine. Pie." He said it like it was some sort of awful, blasphemous thing.

She _liked _pie.

Idiot.

He decided that he could get cake too. Extra baked goods were always appreciated.

Plus, _he _liked cake.

That had to count for something.

* * *

#8: Goodbye

There would be no suffering. He would not have to pine for her in the last years of his life, she would not have to miss him. For the past 40 years they'd been together, always.

And even now, in death, it came at them both, head on. This was not a great battle, this was a simple end to one-shared-wonderful life. Full of happiness, and sorrow. Full of saving, falling, and getting back up stronger than ever.

Their lives, full of battling, simply ended.

They hadn't so much lost a battle though. They had been ready.

Wrapped together, they fell into that last-eternal-sleep. Never to awaken to life again.

Never to be apart either.

* * *

#9: 47

Damn him.

He wasn't going to ask her again.

She was going to ask him.

Fine. If this was how it had to be.

She hoped he felt really, really emasculated.

Okay, that was mean.

But all he had to do was ask her one more time.

She set the scene: flowers, music, champagne. And then she had the misfortune to get held up in a robbery.

A _robbery_.

And who else, but the Green Arrow would appear to save her? Damn him.

After he'd knocked out the robber, she stared at him, in the middle of the alleyway and just . . . blurted it out.

"Marry me."

His eyes went wide.

"Seriously? This is the moment you decide that you want to marry me?"

"Well, you stopped asking. This is really your fault. If you'd just asked the other day, when I kept hinting at how I'd changed my mind, we wouldn't be in this mess."

"My fault?"

That was almost funny.

Ollie looked at her for a moment, took her hand, and walked her back to Watchtower.

He looked around, at her obvious attempt at a romantic gesture.

Okay, it was so close to being funny.

He started to take off his Green Arrow gear, not really meeting her eyes. Letting her just stare at him.

"Ollie?" she said tentatively when he changed into sweats and a t-shirt.

He sighed.

That, of course, only made her angry.

"Seriously Ollie, considering how many times you've asked me to marry you, you'd think you might just-I don'tknow-have something to say. Like, yes, maybe?"

"Really, Chloe? Do you know how many times I asked you to marry me in the course of the last year?"

She stared, "Um, not exactly."

"47."

Oh.

That was a lot-but she really hadn't been counting. She really had hurt him, hadn't she?

"Ollie, I'm sorry. If it makes you feel better, I'll take back this whole proposal thing, and we'll go back to being . . . whatever we were."

"Oh no, Chloe." He grabbed the engagement ring he'd been carrying around with him for what seemed like forever and took her hand.

"You know I won't let you take it back. You love me, and you asked me to marry you. And I'm saying yes." He slipped the ring onto her finger.

"I'm not going to kneel down, but you know that. You and I are going to enter into this as equals. I want to be with you, forever. In the most permanent way possible."

She really did love this man.

"Chloe, I love you. I need you, and I want you, and I don't want to live my life without you. You're my sidekick-even though sometimes, I swear it feels like I'm yours."

She kissed him, cutting off any potential flow of further words.

Minutes later, when they came up for air, she wondered.

"Why did you stop asking me?"

"Oh, that. I was waiting."

"For what, exactly?"

"You. To be ready, that is. I'd wait forever for you, Chloe."

"You don't have to, I love you too Ollie."

"So, um, when we tell this story, who gets credit for the proposal?"

"Let's just say we came to a mutual agreement."

_Finally._

* * *

Pure fluffy nonsense :) Review?


	2. Chapter 2

More Chlollie bits. I disclaim. They are, of course, in a weird little order that isn't chronological. Fluff! :)

* * *

#10: Family

"I hate you."

"Okay."

A lesser man may have laughed, or smiled at the situation, but a lesser man he was not.

And, if he had done either of those things . . . He would have become a lesser man. Certainly, at least, they wouldn't have a repeat of this episode.

You see, Oliver Queen and his wife Chloe were having a baby.

Now, in fact. And things were not going well.

First, her water had broken at a horribly inopportune time, at someone's _wedding. _Her cousin Lucy's, in fact. Then, she'd missed out on the reception, which meant she missed out on the cake. And the cake had looked really, really good. Even though she was more of a pie girl-it went better with coffee-it was never fun to miss out on sweets.

Then she'd ruined her dress-not that it mattered since it was a maternity dress and she wouldn't ever wear it again because they would_ not be having any more children,_ because it was rather painful. Still, it had been a really beautiful dress that had taken her forever and a day to pick out.

On the way to the hospital, they hit traffic. She refused, _refused _to give birth in a car. It was simply not going to happen.

Luckily, it hadn't.

And hours later, they were in the hospital room and she . . . was not having the baby.

She had been waiting for ten hours. And still, no baby.

A nurse told her to be patient, and she told the nurse in no uncertain terms what to do with her patience. That nurse had disappeared, and had been replaced.

Chloe made the replacement cry in mere minutes.

Finally though, her doctor had come in, and she was finally going to have her baby.

However, now Oliver was holding her hand, wondering if he'd ever regain feeling in it as he watched his wife give birth to their first child. Or, as Chloe often threatened, their _only _child.

He hated seeing her in pain.

But seeing the smile on her face when the doctor placed their little baby boy in her arms?

He loved seeing that.

He felt a surge of love for his family. His _family_. Something he hadn't really ever believed that he would have.

And everything felt right in the world, in this moment. And he believed in forever.

* * *

#11: Not without you

"I thought I'd lost you."

It pained him to realize that. To realize that as much as he had been desperately trying to get home, she had been desperately trying to find him. Not that he wasn't glad she'd been looking, but the last thing he wanted to do was break her heart. She'd had enough of that already.

"I'm here. And I don't intend to go anywhere."

The first thing she'd done when she'd seen him was propel herself into his arms. Now, she pushed away from him, looked up into his eyes.

"I-I need to explain something to you."

Oliver was beginning to worry a bit, "Okay, um, explain away."

"I loved Jimmy. I did. But I never loved him enough. I . . . wasn't right for him anymore than he was right for me."

This was hard for her to say. "You don't have to do this Chloe, you don't have to explain yourself to me."

She smiled nervously, "I know, but I need to."

She slipped out of his arms and began to pace.

"When Jimmy died, I hurt. I was in pain."

He could see shadows of that pain on her face right now.

"But I could live without him. I mean, I did. I _am _living without him."

He didn't quite see where she was going with this. "Yeah, you are."

"Oliver, Clark is my oldest friend. And if something happened to him, I would be upset."

"I'm not sure I'm following."

"But I would be okay, eventually," she continued as if he hadn't said anything.

"But Ollie, I thought I lost you." She started crying, tears rolling down her face.

He pulled her back into his arms. "But you didn't."

"But if I had . . . "

"But you didn't."

She gave him a look. She wiped her tears away with her hands. "You need to stop interrupting me."

"Sorry," he wanted to smile, but he didn't really have it in him to smile at Chloe while she was crying.

"I wouldn't have wanted to live without you. I would have, because I don't have a choice, I have responsibilities."

Oh.

"But I wouldn't have wanted to be in this world alone. Not without you. I . . ."

"It's okay. I-" He struggled to find the words. "I don't want to live in a world without you either."

Chloe buried her head in Oliver's chest before uttering her threat.

"If something happens to you . . . I will call Zatanna and bring you back to life, just so that I can kill you again."

"Okay."

"Because I don't want to live without you."

"I don't want you to have to."

"I love you."

"Ditto."

* * *

#12: Seriously?

"No."

"Why not?" Connor whined.

"You and Jonas aren't ready for a puppy."

"Why?"

"Sweetie, you can barely remember to put on socks in the morning, and taking care of a puppy is a lot of work. It's a serious responsibility. Maybe when you're a little older, we can talk about it again, okay?"

As much as it killed her to say no to those beautiful brown eyes, she was right. They weren't ready.

"But mom-"

"No buts. Why don't you go grab your brother, and we'll go out for ice cream!"

Compromise, Chloe sighed as she watched her baby boy-who was no longer a baby, but still her boy-run off to find his little brother, was a necessary aspect of parenting.

"Hey Sidekick," Ollie swooped in behind her and kissed her neck.

"Mmm, you're home early." She sank into him until she felt a softness.

"Seriously?" She turned around, ready to be furious.

"It's a puppy!" she heard Jonas exclaim.

Yes. Yes it was. She felt a little light-headed.

"What part of 'no' didn't you get?" She whispered not-so-quietly to her husband.

"I thought . . . Chloe, they wanted a puppy. And I saw this puppy, and I-"

She sighed. "You fell in love with the puppy, didn't you?"

"Basically."

"You're really softening in your old age." She took the verbal shot, dared him to say something, and turned to their boys.

She looked into the eyes of her sons, of her husband, and lastly, the puppy.

"Come on, mom. Give him a chance."

Completely outvoted. "Fine."

After all, he _was _rather cute.

* * *

#13: Spermies.

"Again?" Chloe groaned.

She was pregnant.

Again.

As in, for the third time.

Oliver and his . . . stupid spermies.

They'd said two was okay. Sure, they'd rather wanted a girl, but . . . they didn't really need to have another child at this point.

Yet again, their plans went out the window.

As the minutes passed, and she began to adjust to the idea of being pregnant again, she felt a powerful surge of emotion.

She hoped it was a girl.

No, that wasn't right.

She _knew _it was a girl.

She knew it was ridiculous, and probably more hope than fact, but it was a girl.

In fact, she felt it in her heart and soul.

This would be their little girl.

If it weren't . . . she was going to have a little talk with Oliver and his sperm.

* * *

#14: Graveside chat

Chloe Sullivan was talking to dead people.

Not so much in a creepy _Sixth Sense_ sort of way as an ordinary graveside chat. Of course, most of the talking was on her part-in fact, _all _of the talking was on her side. That was probably for the best though.

"I'm about to marry your son."

Chloe looked at the matching gravestones that Oliver had put up in honor of his parents and sighed aloud.

"He's really great. I hope-I think you'd be proud of him. He's been through a lot, and he's made mistakes. But he's a good man."

She smiled. "I love him, and I want to make him as happy as he makes me."

"I've made a lot of mistakes myself. But when I'm with Oliver . . . I make less of them."

"I wish-I wish you could see him. I wish you could know him. I wish I could have met you. I hope . . . I hope you'd be happy that we chose each other."

She sighed, she really didn't know where she was going this.

"I just wanted to tell you that. Even if you can't exactly answer. I-thank you."

She set down the flowers she'd brought, next to each of the stones.

She hoped she'd gotten the message through. She looked up, and saw a rainbow. No rain, no mist, no clouds in the sky . . . she decided to take it as a sign.

"Thank you."

* * *

#15: Lois

(A/N: post-Crossfire, pre-Warrior)

Sometimes she wondered.

She wondered if he still loved her. If he still regretted giving her up.

Now, years later, she wished she hadn't agreed with him.

She wondered if she'd put it in his head that he would always have to look to her as "the one who got away."

At the time, her heart had been breaking, and the melodramatic moment, and his emotionally-charged question had gotten the best of her.

She certainly didn't regret that they'd broken up, but she didn't regret being with him either.

She'd learned a lot about herself during that relationship, and she rather thought she'd bestowed something special upon Oliver too.

Sometimes, however, it was hard realizing that while she had moved on-she'd moved so far that she couldn't imagine going back-he hadn't necessarily done so.

Weeks ago, he'd asked her to give him another chance. She'd said no, but not just because she didn't love him anymore.

She rather thought he was living in the past.

He was self-destructing, at least until the whole crazy woman in the red dress fiasco.

Since then he'd seemed . . . better.

Healthier. Happier. He seemed like Oliver again.

But she really needed to clear the air, be absolutely sure. Make sure he moved on, from those crazy women and one night stands.

He was meant for more than that, and he deserved it.

So she was stopping by for a little surprise chat, partially because she didn't trust him not to avoid her, and partially because this was going to be a difficult discussion to have.

After all, she was Lois Lane-she didn't wimp out. She had an image to keep up, a reputation. Lois Lane was not afraid of anything.

Certainly not a man.

...

"Hey Ollie! How's it going? Is this a bad time? I hope not. Because I kind of need to talk to you."

He seemed a bit nervous. "Um, Lois, you might need to lay off the perky. What's up?"

"Do you remember when at Chloe's wedding to Jimmy, we turned a corner?"

A shadow she didn't quite understand crossed his face. "I said that from that point forward we could just be really good friends."

"Yeah, but that wasn't quite it. I've moved on, Oliver. But I worry that you haven't."

"Lois-I know that things got awkward a few weeks ago. I was clinging onto something that ended a long time ago. I've been kind of a mess." He laughed, and it almost seemed genuine.

"I was trying to rely on the old ease and comfort of our relationship-which in retrospect . . . wasn't even that easy."

"Do you mean that? Are you ready to finally move on?"

"I've met someone."

She wrung her hands, "Are you just saying that? Or have you really?"

He smiled, one of those glowy, sun-coming-out-suddenly-in-a-stormy-night kinds of smiles. And when he replied "Yes," she believed him, wholeheartedly.

"I'm happy for you."

"Thanks."

"Anyways. Good luck. Um, I'll see you later."

Oliver smiled and shook his head as he watched her leave.

He was going to need all the luck he could get.

* * *

#16: Clark

"I don't resent you."

"I don't know that I believe that."

"Clark . . . I get it. I do. You have this shiny, important destiny. You have lives to save, and I was just . . . making things difficult."

"Chloe. I never meant to make you feel that way."

"I know. Doesn't make it any less true though," she said ruefully.

"I don't understand . . . why are you asking me? Over the last few years, I haven't been there for you. I haven't . . . "

"Look, Clark. Things are better now. At least, I thought they were. We're friends again, right?"

"I'm sorry."

"Why?"

"That I stopped being your friend." He turned to the side, unable to meet her eyes. "Lately, I've been trying to get back on track, I hadn't realized . . . "

"I know, Clark. We've all made mistakes. All we can do is try to make less of them in the future."

Clark smiled, "Oliver once said something very similar to me."

Chloe raised an eyebrow, "That's a smart man I'm about to marry. So, what do you say? Walk me down the aisle?"

"If you'll have me, I'd love to."

"Clark?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm glad that we're moving past this. I missed you."

"I'm glad that Lois finally talked some sense into me. Avoiding you because of everything that happened . . . I shouldn't have done that. I missed you too."

"So let's just try not to mess things up this time, 'kay?"

"Okay."

* * *

#17: Falling

He hadn't quite known it as it was happening.

In fact, he was pretty sure it hadn't hit him until it was too late, until he'd already fallen completely, irrevocably in love with her.

It was . . . different than with Tess and Lois.

With Tess, it had started as survival, and been passionate, and . . . it was like a game.

With Lois, it had started with . . . courting. It was fun and sexy.

Chloe was different.

She was his person.

His confidante, his failsafe, his best friend(though she didn't know it), his savior, his hope for the future, his _everything_.

She lived in the gray, like he did. Other people couldn't handle that. But they could, and they did it together.

They were friends. So he'd fallen, without noticing until it was too late, until he was too in love with her to cut himself off from her. And now he was utterly in love with her, and she barely acknowledged that there was a world outside of Watchtower.

This wasn't going to be easy. But it would be worth it-even if he had to push her from her comfortable ledge in Watchtower, just so that he could catch her when she fell.

Metaphorically, of course.

* * *

#18: Still outnumbered

"But I wanna go to the zoo!" Jonas whined.

"Mom, can we take Chance with us, please?" Laura smiled up at her mother.

"Sorry Laura, no dogs allowed." Laura saddened, then perked up when her father handed her her favorite doll.

"Jonas, you know it's not your turn to pick, honey." Chloe gently chided her younger son.

"I don't see why we can't just take a vote, majority rules and all." Connor put in.

Chloe looked at him, raised an eyebrow, "Because even though Laura's finally old enough to pick where she wants to go, the girls in this family are _still _outnumbered 3-2."

"Why don't you just have more babies then?" Laura asked innocently.

Oliver choked on his drink. "Kiddo, I don't think that's in the cards right now."

Chloe turned to him, and he considered running. "What do you mean, _now_? You're supposed to mean ever. We talked about this."

"Come on, don't you want another mini-me running around?"

"I think we have enough Queen Ego in this house as it is, thank you very much. Especially since you take such care in stroking your own."

"You know you love me," he smirked.

"Sometimes, I wonder why."

"Me too, but I'm thankful every day that you do."

"Mom, Dad, are you going to stop making goo-goo eyes at each other long enough so that we can go, please?"

"Don't worry, your father and I wouldn't dream of cutting into your time spent with the newest Disney Princess."

Jonas scowled, "I only meant that if we have to watch it, we may as well be on time."

"You know, he has a point, Chloe."

"Does he now? That's okay, if we're late we can just watch it again next weekend."

Her lips quirked into a smile as she heard a trio of male moans.

"Don't you think so, sweetie?"

Laura giggled, "Yes!"

* * *

#19: Forever and Always

"It's like that Taylor Swift song?"

Oliver wrinkled his brow in confusion. "The one she wrote about the guy who broke up with her?"

. . .

"How do you even know that?"

"I'm in the tabloids. Sometimes I read other things . . . to remind myself that I'm not the only one dealing with notoriety.

Chloe quirked an eyebrow, "Really?"

"Hey, you're the one who brought it up. I was just questioning whether or not it was really what you meant."

"That's why it was a question, for you to do exactly that. Except I kind of expected that you'd have no idea what I was talking about."

"Well, I do."

"I'm torn between loving you more, and being ashamed of you." A teasing glint in her eye said that she wasn't quite serious.

"How about you just love me, and we can just live happily ever after?"

Chloe visibly softened, melted into his arms, "I think I can do that."

"Forever and always?"

"Forever and always," she confirmed.

* * *

So . . . much . . . fluff :) Review?


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